Our opening salvo comes from Facebook. We begin with the politely argued case from a female family member, in response to a linked blog post. Recently an Indian diplomat was arrested because it was discovered that she was paying her domestic worker less than half of New York’s minimum wage. Naturally, this has kicked up debate. Is this about law, or culture? Is the law a reasonable one? Aren’t diplomats supposed to be immune from NYPD strip searches? Foolish reader! Nobody is safe from the NYPD.

The OP comes back at her with this screed, in two parts (because idiots never know how to make paragraph breaks):

He continues:

Allow me to translate… with paragraph breaks.

We should agree to disagree! You’re a woman and so I don’t really take you seriously, hence I won’t engage in an actual debate. I don’t like arguing but I’m going to argue anyway. Any attempts you make to respond to me will be disregarded, as we are agreeing to disagree.

1. “People are squarely split” — I don’t believe all these “people” actually count for anything, so I’m going to ignore the opinions of half the population and instead tell you again why my views are the correct ones.

I only believe studies that support my preconceived notions. The burden of proof is much higher when you disagree with me. I have a bizarrely skewed view of economics that ignores all nation-states that contradict my views. In order for me to even consider what you have to say you would have to provide “overwhelming empirical evidence”–I have not bothered to see if this already exists, but I invite you to do the legwork instead.

At best we have numerous capitalist and socialized-capitalist countries in which the system you propose works, despite any initial doomsday scenarios such as I have described. None of this matters because I can blame everything on poor people and their spending habits. Even better, I can blame the whole thing on the economy as a whole, which has these supply and demand issues–don’t I sound smart? Poor people can never afford to buy the things they make, and paying them enough so they could would bankrupt employers who then couldn’t hire them… I believe the rising tide sinks all boats because I have never actually been to the ocean or met someone whose financial circumstances differ substantially from my own.

Anyway, India is Different and so no studies in existence have any bearing on us. I am going to use big words again to make it sound like my next few sentences make sense even though they blatantly do not. I’ll also throw in some references to other arguments that my political peers are infamously wrong about. This is totally going to shore up my argument, which is totally relevant to your arguments.

I am right and therefore my magical thinking allows me to believe that the majority shares my opinion. I don’t believe in polls because they are too much like studies, which have no application here, etc.

2. I don’t know how to measure things like fairness, bargaining power or dignity because I am a douchebag who is limited by metrics. I’m not saying that your soft, feminine points of contention aren’t valid arguments, I’m just saying that you’re way too subjective to make the arguments. Because you have a vagina. If you call me on this insult I will point to the agree-to-disagree clause and call you a hysterical bitch.

3. My solution to this problem of poorly treated domestic workers is to tell them to get jobs in other fields. It doesn’t matter that the demand for domestic labor is high and will likely remain so. The people who stay in those jobs are just too dumb to go work in factories, are less than human, etc., etc. so on and so forth. See arguments RE: your non-personhood :: ovaries. I have also drunk the no-regulation-is-good-regulation Kool-Aid. What is this Somalia of which you speak?

4. You might have a point as to treating people like human beings, but that would force me to shift my entire worldview and I am totes not ready to do that. You are a bad person for implying that I may be lacking in compassion.

5. I am disturbed. It also disturbs me that you liberal types are so ready to butt your noses into my profits. If I want to offer a contract that is biased in my favor and some underprivileged wretch is dumb enough to sign it then I should be able to do with them what I will. I mean, I don’t go around telling you to quit your weird interracial marriages and shit, do I? I don’t tell you not to vote, do I? I make false equivalencies, don’t I?

If there were something actually wrong with what I’m proposing then there would be studies, wouldn’t there? It’d already be proven to be a bad idea, wouldn’t it? We’d have a better solution by now but we don’t so I am right. You wouldn’t like it if I went around imposing eugenics or something, would you? I didn’t think so.

I don’t know why people think it’s ok to make laws around economics. It’s not like we do for agriculture, medicine, industry, voting, the military so on and so forth. These areas get to enjoy wholly unrestricted freedom! Why must you target my precious, precious free market? LAISSEZ-FAIRE and LET IT BE! LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE.

You want to litigate some things but not others so I’m going to call you inconsistent without bothering to examine your philosophy and see if there is, in fact, consistency. I don’t really care what you think, as you’re not really a person. I don’t think you’d like it if we let all your pet issues go up for a popular vote. Everyone agrees with me, you see (as per #1). Remember, no one’s going to agree with you because you can’t even be consistent. I’m consistently an asshole, and like Chris Christie I shall ride my wave of bullshit into the presidency.

We will not resolve this on FB! I berate you for contradicting me in a public forum!

This domain is coming up on 10 years old. It was purchased in a fit of inspiration, and has served as the home for many little side projects. Still, nothing ever quite suited the original name. At last I have a project worthy of the title.

All quoted material is legit. It comes straight from the jackasses’ mouths and fingertips. Sources are not always cited, in an attempt to protect the ignorant.